From Transaction Cost to Transactional Value Analysis: Implications for the Study of Interorganizational Strategies*

ABSTRACT This article examines interorganizational strategies from a transactional value, rather than transaction cost, perspective. It argues that the transaction cost perspective has at least two major limitations when used to analyse interorganizational strategies: (1) a single‐party, cost minimization emphasis that neglects the interdependence between exchange partners in the pursuit of joint value, and (2) an over‐emphasis on the structural features of interorganizational exchange that neglects important process issues. We propose instead a transactional value framework for analysing interorganizational strategies that addresses (1) joint value maximization, and (2) the processes by which exchange partners create and claim value. We discusses the implications of the present approach for the study of interorganizational strategies and for the transaction cost perspective itself.